


The Backwater Of Your Mouth

by katabasis (aphorat)



Category: BUCK-TICK
Genre: Alternate Universe - Fantasy, Alternate Universe - Merpeople, Alternate Universe - Urban Fantasy, First Time, M/M
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2018-05-11
Updated: 2018-05-11
Packaged: 2019-05-05 12:19:55
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 2
Words: 3,768
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14618412
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/aphorat/pseuds/katabasis
Summary: At the seaside, in springtime, he meets Atsushi.





	1. under that frond of stars

Hisashi goes to the seaside in spring, ostensibly to visit his relatives but in truth, to get out of Fujioka. Even the wooded mountains of northern Gunma are too close to home, too claustrophobic after living there his whole life. He has his own cramped apartment but still works at his family's tobacconist down the street, and sometimes it suffocates him.  
  
So he goes west to the comparatively rural jut of the Noto Peninsula, staying with an aunt and her husband—shopkeepers, just like his own parents, but childless and easygoing in a slow-moving town by the sea. It isn't a particularly beautiful town, like the ones lined along the jewel-toned inland seas further south, but it's rugged, wind-worn and breathtaking in its own way.   
  
Hisashi heads to a rocky strip of shoreline after dinner, to stretch out on a half-sunken wooden dock and drink from a partially full flask of whisky. Maybe it makes a sad picture, drinking alone on a gradually collapsing dock, but it's comfortable—legs dangling lazily off the side as he drinks and get lost in Wikipedia articles pulled up on his phone. He gets through _Germany_ , _Weimar Republic_ , _Dada_ and _Postmodernism_ before he starts to get drowsy; from the alcohol, the bright, small screen of his phone, or perhaps both.   
  
He nods off eventually, as the sun sinks low on the horizon. His phone has been tucked safely away in a jacket pocket, but he's still holding his flask, and when his hand goes slack it slips from his fingers and into the water below. The loud, quick splash wakes him up, and he pushes himself onto his knees and peers down with a grumbled  _fuck_. The water looks pretty deep, and it's getting dark besides. The flask isn't a treasured family heirloom or anything, but he likes it, and it wasn't even empty. He doesn't stand a chance in finding it, and he flops back down on the dock with a dejected sigh.   
  
His back's only just touched down on the wood when he hears the water below ripple and churn, and he twinges his back when he sits up again—too quickly, and promptly going slack-jawed at the sight before him.   
  
There's a man in the water, combing long black hair out of his eyes with one hand while the other places his flask gently onto the dock. Hisashi can see where the man's bare waist fades from pale skin to dark scales, glinting faintly in the water. "You lost this," he says, arms sweeping the water's surface in shallow sculling movements. When he blinks the remaining traces of saltwater away there's not one set of eyelids, but two, and Hisashi gawks at the sight.   
  
"...Are you fucking serious," Hisashi deadpans, shaken, and the merman responds with a deep, sonorous laugh. He's handsome, in an otherworldly sort of way, and his smile is only a little bit sharp. His kind has a reputation that precedes them, deceptively beautiful and dangerous—but Hisashi's sense of self-preservation has always been quick to forsake him, and he edges forward to get a better look at his unexpected guest.   
  
"I didn't think it was dropped intentionally, but if I was mistaken..." The merman holds his arm outstretched, palm open, and Hisashi shakes his head, taking the flask and wiping it off on his jeans.   
  
"Oh, uh, no, sorry. Thanks. I was just... not expecting to see it again. Certainly not handed back to me by a..." he trails off, making a vague gesture at the merman, who laughs again in response. The edge of his tail fin flicks above the water's surface, long and trailing and speckled with white markings.   
  
"By someone like me," the merman finishes tactfully, eyes glinting in good humor as he hefts his top half onto the dock. He settles against it, arms folded in front of him, and Hisashi backs up to give him space only as an afterthought. "You're welcome." The merman casts Hisashi a sidelong glance, studying his features, and it makes him feel a bit fidgety to be so carefully scrutinized. "Are you from around here?" He asks after a long moment, chin resting leisurely against his wrist. "I haven't seen you before."  
  
_No,_  thinks Hisashi,  _no I am not._  He probably wouldn't have been so taken aback if he was. "I'm from Gunma, visiting family. I haven't been up here in ten, maybe twelve years."   
  
"Welcome, then," the merman grins, and Hisashi uncaps his flask.  
  
They continue that way for a while; Hisashi talking about his family in town, the merman listening while his hair dries in the chill evening air. He introduces himself belatedly as Atsushi, apologizes for not doing so earlier, but Hisashi just shrugs and passes him the flask. It's comfortable, surprisingly so, and they find themselves discussing the local history, which Atsushi seems to have a near-encyclopedic knowledge of. An hour passes before Hisashi checks his phone, wincing at the time. "Shit," he mutters, "I should be getting back. I don't want my aunt and uncle waiting up for me. But, you know, it was fun talking, and thanks again for this." He holds up his now empty flask, knees creaking as he stands, and Atsushi smiles up at him and slips back into the water.   
  
"How long will you be here?" He asks, and Hisashi pauses mid-turn to think. He was only going to spend the weekend here, a quick breather before heading back Sunday night. But, then again... his siblings and cousin can always cover a few more shifts, right? He's never had a proper vacation, and he's more than earned one. He'll call his parents when he gets home, and tell them he'll be in town longer than expected.   
  
"I'm playing it by ear," he replies impulsively, glancing down at the calendar on his phone. "Five days, maybe? More if I can manage it. I think this place is growing on me." That makes Atsushi positively beam, radiant in a way that makes his heart leap. Maybe it's predictable, to be so taken with one of the ocean's rare inhabitants, but Hisashi finds that for once, he doesn't mind being unoriginal.   
  
"I'm sure it is. I'll see you around." It's enticing, the way Atsushi says it, and the man himself looks a bit—not quite predatory, but eager.  
  
Hisashi finds he rather likes the way Atsushi looks at him, and swallows around a faint smile. "See you," He echoes, waving once before turning to make his way into town. He can hear the water splash behind him, and when he glances back around there are only ripples, and a long dark shadow moving just beneath the surface.

Hisashi comes to the dock every day that week, and Atsushi is always there to meet him, waiting by the shore with a smile slashed across his smooth, pale face. Sometimes they stay there at the dock, with Hisashi's legs swinging as they hang off the edge, but sometimes Hisashi goes down to the rocks, and Atsushi pulls himself out of the water to sit with him in the sun. His scales glint in the light, iridescent like crow's wings, and every now and then Atsushi will catch him staring. There's something there between them, unspoken but almost tangible the way it tugs at Atsushi's heart.

When they meet on the morning Hisashi leaves for Gunma, both of them are tired and almost somber in the early morning fog. Hisashi leans in as they sit side by side on the shore, but Atsushi chooses that moment to slip back into the water, smile slight but full of promise. "Come back soon," he entreats, licking the saltwater from his lips, and his grin widens when Hisashi nods at once, muttering something about justifying the six hour train ride both ways. They part shortly after, and Atsushi sinks beneath the waves already anticipating his next visit.  
  
The gills at his neck ripple and open as he swims up past the harbor, until the coastline is a jagged scar across the sea: all sheer cliffs with waves that carve as they crash against its face. He descends to the bottom of the kelp forest where he makes his home, a tangle of dark purple-brown stalks some eighty feet down. He coils his tail around one of the thicker stalks and sinks into a daydream, imagining Hisashi's dyed brown hair fanning out around him like a halo. 


	2. under our thickening kisses

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> fragments of their subsequent visits.

Hisashi returns twice that spring, for short weekend trips that leave Atsushi staring at the shoreline long after he's returned to his hometown. The merman reveals more about himself over time, and in time he learns that they're near the same age. He was born in the warm waters surrounding the Ryukyu Arc—it's customary, he learns, for Atsushi's kind to spend their early years in the south before dispersing and making their way to colder climes, and the lives they lead in adulthood are solitary more often than not.   
  
"So are you the only one here, then? No family?" Hisashi asks him one night as he perches on the dock, and Atsushi nods, expression carefully impassive.  
  
"It isn't uncommon for us to leave our families early on," he replies, casting a backwards glance at the sea. "My nearest neighbors are kilometers away, and they are not my family." He'd made sure of that, when he chose this stretch of coastline years ago.   
  
"That would be weird, for me," Hisashi muses after a while, bare feet dipping into the water. "I'm always surrounded by family. Even here, I'm with my aunt and uncle."   
  
" _That_ ," the merman replies, tone light despite his earlier solemnity, "sounds weird to  _me_."  
  
Hisashi describes to him, then, the shop he works at, the parents and siblings and cousins, aunts, uncles—it seems like such a busy life to Atsushi, a tiring life—but Hisashi doesn't seem to mind it, and when he smiles when talking about his family and his work, Atsushi smiles too.  
  
-  
  
It's at the end of that third visit, late in May not long after a festival that has the Imai family's shop overflowing with customers, that Hisashi rolls up his pant legs and picks his way to the pebbled shore, finding Atsushi where he rests tucked against a half-submerged boulder. "The water's getting warmer," he observes, half to himself, and the other man nods, tail swishing behind him as he moves closer to the other man.   
  
"It'll be warm enough for you to swim in, before long," he replies, lips curved up into a hopeful smile, and Hisashi leans back with a hum, brow furrowed as he considers it. "Can you?" Atsushi adds, peering up at him. "Swim, I mean. I shouldn't have assumed."   
  
"I can," Hisashi replies, glancing down to where Atsushi's perched by his leg. Long, pale fingers splay against the rock, close to his thigh but not close  _enough_ , and Hisashi shifts then, experimentally. It's a slight movement, barely-there, but now those fingers are settled against the seam of his jeans, still and cold but a comfortable presence all the same. "It's been a while, but I'm sure I'll manage just fine."   
  
Atsushi's smile widens then, and the hand resting against his leg slides up to press against it fully. "I wouldn't let you sink," he says, and leans up to capture Hisashi's lips in a kiss. His lips are cold, tasting of brine, but his mouth is hot when Hisashi's tongue slips inside it, running along his sharp incisors with care. They remain that way for a long while, as the sky darkens and the water grows cold and begins once more to rise.   
  
-  
  
Atsushi swims down the shoreline, surfacing every now and again to survey the area. He searches for somewhere secluded, but not dangerous—no waves crashing against the rocks, no whirlpools to pull Hisashi under. Atsushi finds himself envious, though, of the water's ability to take without remorse, to trap what it wants within its strong currants and carry it away. That envy eats at his mind, when he's back in his forested home, and he makes the decision to seek someone out, someone who can ease the pressure of his thoughts.  
  
He finds a woman situated precariously near the continental shelf, kilometers away from his own home near the mainland. Before them the abyssal plain stretches on, endless and dark, with sea life coming in and out of focus as it passes in the distance. She has the long trailing body of a remora, and has latched on to her fair share of humans with the same unyielding grasp. The woman understands his affliction though, and she offers decades-worth of advice as they dine on writhing squid.   
  
He returns to the coastal waters feeling consoled, and weaves through the kelp fronds more at ease than he had been since Hisashi's departure. He has gifts, after all, and the water will listen if he entreats it. Now he knows he can make Hisashi safe, both in the water and with him, and the next day he returns to the southern shores, still searching for a place where they can swim together.  
  
-  
  
Hisashi crouches on the dock under a polka-dot umbrella, hair slicked back from the rain coming in torrents from the sky. It's June, the height of the rainy season, and Atsushi seems to be enjoying the weather as he twists in the rippling water. "I found a good place for you," he says, voice raised to counter the rush of raindrops on the surface, "for us. It's about twenty minutes away, not too long. The rain should ease up tomorrow; we could meet then."  
  
"How will I know where to find it?" Hisashi asks, and then his eyes widen as Atsushi reaches up onto the dock and pulls himself out entirely. He sits beside him on the rocks near the shore, but always remains half-submerged, tail disappearing into the shallows. Now though, the length of him is there for Hisashi to see in full, and Hisashi's too far gone to hide the way he stares. Atsushi allows it, ever indulgent, tail swaying lazily where it hangs off the dock's edge.   
  
"Open up a map for me, on your phone," he says eventually, curving close to the other man, and Hisashi blinks once before pulling his gaze away from the rivulets of water trailing down Atsushi's pale torso. Hisashi does as he's asked, zooming in to their current location, but he keeps stealing glances at Atsushi all the while, finding himself warm in a way that has nothing to do with the humidity.   
  
Atsushi guides him to the location he's selected, and Hisashi nods when he confirms that he'll be there tomorrow, just after noon. Once he's pocketed his phone he urges a kiss to the hollow of Atsushi's throat, lips curving against the skin before he trails to the side of his neck. He forgets, in his ardor, to expect the flutter of gills beneath his lips and draws back momentarily when Atsushi draws a sharp intake of breath. "Sorry," he breathes hastily, but Atsushi just shakes his head, dark hair falling in his eyes.  
  
"Don't be sorry," he says, and soon his lips are back, light and exploratory in the way they move over the sensitive tissue.   
  
Hisashi returns to his aunt and uncle's soaked through but grinning faintly, shucking off wet clothing and changing into his pajamas. There's a teru teru bozu hanging in the kitchen window when he grabs a mug of tea that evening, and he looks at it intently before muttering  _don't fuck this up_.   
  
-  
  
Hisashi takes a bus the next day, south along the coast to a small, sleepy hamlet tucked just far enough inland. It's about a thirty minute walk down to the waterfront, but the sun is shining and there's not a raincloud to be seen. When the trees part and he sees the ocean sprawled out before him he smiles, just a little, and walks with a bit more purpose as he makes his way to the shore.   
  
The coast is scattered with large brown rocks that warm in the sun and sprawling shallow pools revealed with the tides. There's a strip of beach too, not large but nice and enclosed by a narrow inlet, and there's an overgrown path dotted with hydrangeas leading down to the sand. After making his way down Hisashi drops his bag, glancing around once before starting to undress. He kicks off his sandals first, then sheds his shorts and t-shirt to reveal the slim-fitting swim trunks beneath.   
  
Atsushi is nowhere to be seen, and idly, Hisashi wanders down to the water's edge, picking his way through accumulated seaweed and washed up shells. The water chases up the beach and laps over his feet, and he hisses at the temperature but doesn't move away. He'll acclimate, he supposes, and steps in up to his ankles. He remains like this, walking along the edge and inspecting shells as he waits, and in time the water seems to warm—first gradually, then in a way that seems almost unnatural. Hisashi's brow furrows when he notices this, but then he hears the churn and splash of water and sees Atsushi appear among the broken waves.   
  
"It should be warm enough now," Atsushi says swimming in a little bit closer and beckoning Hisashi forward. "And the floor is sandy, too."  
  
"It wasn't this warm at first," Hisashi begins, somewhat leery as he wades into the water, but Atsushi nods with a self-satisfied smile, grasping Hisashi's hand as soon as he's close enough.   
  
"I asked," he says, lips urging first to Hisashi's knuckles, then his wrist, "very nicely."   
  
"You  _what_ ," Hisashi deadpans even as he strokes his fingers through Atsushi's hair, and the merman explains in imprecise words how he made the water in their inlet heat just slightly. Hisashi's heard things, of course, but there are so many rumors surrounding Atsushi's kind that he hadn't been quick to believe them—but some of those rumors, it seems, have a sliver of truth to them, and he accepts it without further questioning.   
  
"How did you know I was there?" He asks after a moment, and only then does Atsushi look somewhat abashed, turning away as he mutters a response.  
  
"I could smell you," he says quietly, and Hisashi's eyebrows loft above his sunglasses before he croaks out a laugh.   
  
Later, Atsushi procures razor clams from the sand and slices them open with their own shells, and they eat them there on the beach, shaded by the high rocky slopes that surround them.   
  
-  
  
They continue to meet over the summer, both near the town and at the secluded inlet to the south, and as the temperature rises the ocean warms of its own accord, making the blue-green waters more inviting than ever. By August the rains have subsided, giving way to hot days that stretch on slowly. Hisashi's skin turns a warm, tan shade that has his mother teasing him when he passes, because he's never been one to have so much  _color_  on his cheeks.   
  
He likes the beach though, quiet and picturesque, and on weekends he takes books to read in between dips into the sea. It's only then that he finds that Atsushi  _can_  in fact read, though it's one more fact he doesn't elaborate on, and eventually he finds himself bringing books for the other man as well, poetry volumes he devours quickly before returning to the water.  
  
Sometimes he finds himself swimming out into deeper waters, where even the tips of his toes can't brush the sand below. Atsushi supports him easily though, hugging at his waist as Hisashi's legs wrap around his scaled lower half. They find themselves this way one late August day after Obon, Hisashi's fingers buried once more in his hair as his tongue traces the ridges of his gills. Atsushi's head falls back with a murmur of his name, and Hisashi's hips rock forward, automatic—arousal apparent as he presses up against him.   
  
"Can you," Hisashi begins, mumbled against Atsushi's neck, "can we—" he trails off, one hand reaching underwater to trace the edge of one ridged pelvic fin before resting against the spot between them. He can't see what happens then: a shifting of muscle, of cartilage, and then there's something filling his hand, hard and smooth. " _Fuck yes_ ," he breathes as his fingers curl around him, and Atsushi's ensuing laugh soon melts away into a moan.   
  
"It's not too odd for you?" The merman asks, capturing his lips in a brief but searing kiss. "Not too different?" One of his own hands finds Hisashi's cock then, drawing him out of his trunks and stroking him in time with the other man, and he groans before he can respond.  
  
"Hell no," he insists after a moment, shaking his head, "this is perfect." Those extensions of cartilage are grasping at his wrist and holding him fast as his hand works over him, and it's so  _different_  but in a way that entices him, makes him want more. He glances down between their bodies but they're distorted by the water, and all he can make out is the contrast of his blurry arm against the darkness of Atsushi's body—and the muted glint of photophores running up the length of it, standing out stark and beautiful against black scales.   
  
"I want to see you," Hisashi says at last, after sucking a mark to the other man's Adam's apple. They're clinging to each other, teetering on the edge of release but not quite ready to let themselves fall just yet, and Atsushi urges Hisashi's chin up to stare at him, gaze piercing.   
  
"Are you sure?" He asks steadily, and the urgency with which Hisashi responds—kissing him, leaving his lips raw and bitten—is enough to convince him, despite his reluctance. He nods and Hisashi sucks down a deep breath, and then their heads are disappearing underwater, inches beneath the surface.   
  
Hisashi's eyes sting slightly when he opens them but it's worth it, and he comes with the taste of saltwater on his lips and what might've been a moan of Atsushi's name. The merman surprises himself when they both breach the surface moments later, Hisashi gasping for breath and Atsushi trailing kisses along his jaw, his cheeks.  _Well_ , Atsushi thinks as Hisashi urges their lips together,  _I passed the test._  They make their way to shore slowly and sink against the sand, entwined as they rest there like something washed up with the waves.


End file.
